Fixing the Body Bag issue

[flarefighter]

Many players have seen a scenario that sounds something like this: You just finished a fight, and the body bags haven't been taken to the incinerator for some reason or they are just not done, and then you see a minion start deserting. Then you kill it, creating another body bag, as capturing only works for as many holding cells as you have, and disposal requires killing them [After brainwashing they still try to desert]. Then another deserts. Then another. And eventually everyone's rebelling, and there's noone left to pick up the body bags. Your gold gets stolen, your minions start destroying everything, and boom, you're dead. This thread is for people to have a friendly debate about how to solve this issue.

[flarefighter]

My personal opinion is that Body Bags should probably not give a penalty to morale at all, until a long while after they've been left there. This means players will still build Incinerators, but they will not watch their entire army throw itself into the wall.

[Necros]

Thinking about it now, body bags are a bit of a relic from the first game since you had to store them in a freezer unlike here which can be instantly get rid of. Probably had to be changed since minions also leave a body unlike the first game. In the first game you had actually had the ability to capture agents and interrogate them with nonlethal means and let you release them into the wild without any trouble. Killing people meant body bags and you couldn't leave them out in the open because it was detriment for minions and heat for agents. However unlike in EG2, the only real "disposal" was freezer room, leave them out to rot, or the biotanks. So there was a form of limitation in just killing agents, while the incinerators are nice it's just a mere symptom of what others would consider "watering down" with the sequel.

But probably straying a bit from the topic, never really had the domino effect of minion desertion even on release when minions didn't know how to line up for an incinerator. Since I had incinerator rooms for prisons and near areas where "action" was expected. It is disappointing that deserters can't be turned back. Didn't the devs change the morale hit of body bags and instead made it more punishing if you can't pay minions? I think it's fine as it is, but then again I do keep the lair tidy even after a big battle with a lot of bodies.

There's a minion trait called "sees dead people" that supposedly lets them gain morale from body bags. Would say encourage those minions to be muscle or deception, but training priorities in minion manager doesn't seem too reliable.

[flarefighter]

Originally posted by Necros:

Thinking about it now, body bags are a bit of a relic from the first game since you had to store them in a freezer unlike here which can be instantly get rid of. Probably had to be changed since minions also leave a body unlike the first game. In the first game you had actually had the ability to capture agents and interrogate them with nonlethal means and let you release them into the wild without any trouble. Killing people meant body bags and you couldn't leave them out in the open because it was detriment for minions and heat for agents. However unlike in EG2, the only real "disposal" was freezer room, leave them out to rot, or the biotanks. So there was a form of limitation in just killing agents, while the incinerators are nice it's just a mere symptom of what others would consider "watering down" with the sequel.

But probably straying a bit from the topic, never really had the domino effect of minion desertion even on release when minions didn't know how to line up for an incinerator. Since I had incinerator rooms for prisons and near areas where "action" was expected. It is disappointing that deserters can't be turned back. Didn't the devs change the morale hit of body bags and instead made it more punishing if you can't pay minions? I think it's fine as it is, but then again I do keep the lair tidy even after a big battle with a lot of bodies.

There's a minion trait called "sees dead people" that supposedly lets them gain morale from body bags. Would say encourage those minions to be muscle or deception, but training priorities in minion manager doesn't seem too reliable.

The main problem is that, unless you go for a nonlethal trap lair and take a passive approach, you're bound to have one big fight in some place ever so slightly too far from an incinerator, and kaboom, desertion chain. This can still happen for passive playthroughs, but if you're playing as Red Ivan and taking an aggressive approach, you can get chains really easily. The trait doesn't really help, since in an aggressive playthrough you gotta have a lot of muscle minions. The worst part is that if it wasn't for the fact that sometimes deserting minions steal gold, you could just let the deserters go. But nope, instead we gotta obliterate them.
Also, the body bag morale penalty makes no sense. They were HIRED to KILL for muscle minions, and others were hired to maintain traps that eat people alive and figure out how to kill people optimally developing powerful weaponry, and SOME to hide the fact that there is a really angry man/woman plotting world domination with a massive doomsday weapon. what do they'll think they'll be seeing?! toys? Cute animals? Children!?

[Necros]

Originally posted by flarefighter:

The main problem is that, unless you go for a nonlethal trap lair and take a passive approach, you're bound to have one big fight in some place ever so slightly too far from an incinerator, and kaboom, desertion chain. This can still happen for passive playthroughs, but if you're playing as Red Ivan and taking an aggressive approach, you can get chains really easily. The trait doesn't really help, since in an aggressive playthrough you gotta have a lot of muscle minions. The worst part is that if it wasn't for the fact that sometimes deserting minions steal gold, you could just let the deserters go. But nope, instead we gotta obliterate them.

This kinda touches upon what I mentioned in the first section, there really is no "nonlethal" way of getting rid of agents once deception and casino fails and the fighting start. You can brainwash investigators but I think that still counts as missing and will lead to soldiers spawning with the recent system that the devs set up. I never really go out of my way to kill agents and let the casino deal with them when possible (even as Red Ivan). Also should mention that deception minions (and by extension technicians and workers) are the ones that mostly deal with body cleanup. Again never really had much problem with body bags and minion mass desertion. If you are insistent on an aggressive approach, executing a minion with EG is an instant stat refill for minions in the area (although yes it means another body). I never let a deserter escape especially if they steal from the vault. Again I think it's fine as it is, even as Red Ivan I don't think you're suppose to be attracting much attention.

[flarefighter]

Originally posted by Necros:

Originally posted by flarefighter:

The main problem is that, unless you go for a nonlethal trap lair and take a passive approach, you're bound to have one big fight in some place ever so slightly too far from an incinerator, and kaboom, desertion chain. This can still happen for passive playthroughs, but if you're playing as Red Ivan and taking an aggressive approach, you can get chains really easily. The trait doesn't really help, since in an aggressive playthrough you gotta have a lot of muscle minions. The worst part is that if it wasn't for the fact that sometimes deserting minions steal gold, you could just let the deserters go. But nope, instead we gotta obliterate them.

This kinda touches upon what I mentioned in the first section, there really is no "nonlethal" way of getting rid of agents once deception and casino fails and the fighting start. You can brainwash investigators but I think that still counts as missing and will lead to soldiers spawning with the recent system that the devs set up. I never really go out of my way to kill agents and let the casino deal with them when possible (even as Red Ivan). Also should mention that deception minions (and by extension technicians and workers) are the ones that mostly deal with body cleanup. Again never really had much problem with body bags and minion mass desertion. If you are insistent on an aggressive approach, executing a minion with EG is an instant stat refill for minions in the area (although yes it means another body). I never let a deserter escape especially if they steal from the vault. Again I think it's fine as it is, even as Red Ivan I don't think you're suppose to be attracting much attention.

Even with the casino, it just has a chance for the entirety of your operation to just get thrown into a volcano. It's fitting: It's a gamble on whether your entire army rebels or you repel some investigators. Execution works TEMPORARILY, but its a nightmare to get it in everyone's line of sight, and also creates more body bags, and if you keep executing you'll just end up with a dead army. Plus, it means bringing your EG into the site of where a battle once was, and if you don't execute fast enough, you may be putting your EG in danger of being killed by your own minions. Also, some enemies will never leave via distraction, and must be disposed of via agressive means.

[Necros]

Originally posted by flarefighter:

Even with the casino, it just has a chance for the entirety of your operation to just get thrown into a volcano. It's fitting: It's a gamble on whether your entire army rebels or you repel some investigators. Execution works TEMPORARILY, but its a nightmare to get it in everyone's line of sight, and also creates more body bags, and if you keep executing you'll just end up with a dead army.

Yeah depending on how much heat overall you gained with an agency, you'll deal with investigators more likely to start fights anyway. Or depending on which island you use, they'll use the helipad entrance and bypass casino anyway. Either way I don't see how body bags can be a big issue (still) unless maybe playing on hard or something.

[Twelvefield]

Originally posted by flarefighter:

My personal opinion is that Body Bags should probably not give a penalty to morale at all.

As someone who has been around body bags in real life I can say that one is too many, and that they sap your morale for years to come.

[stylesrj]

Originally posted by flarefighter:

Also, the body bag morale penalty makes no sense. They were HIRED to KILL for muscle minions, and others were hired to maintain traps that eat people alive and figure out how to kill people optimally developing powerful weaponry, and SOME to hide the fact that there is a really angry man/woman plotting world domination with a massive doomsday weapon. what do they'll think they'll be seeing?! toys? Cute animals? Children!?

Maybe some people just can't handle the pressure and seeing so many body bags around, especially after a battle might make you have second thoughts about this "evil" thing like maybe they should seek another career path before ending up as one of those bags.